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The Tip.It Times

14th December 2008Issue 199gp

RuneScape Media Revolution

Written by ForsakenMage and edited by Tip.It

There’s nothing quite like a picture. As the old saying goes, a picture is worth a thousand words. It could be a picture of you getting your first adamant plate body, or you running into an old glitch by chance. Something could be said of them: positive, negative, maybe some sort of spam comment or two (or more sometimes). It all contributes to the thousand of words. These pictures capture the accomplishments, the memories, the work put into creating this moment in your playing career.

Over the years we’ve moved on from taking still pictures. In a fascination similar to that of the invention of the first motion picture camera, we find ourselves engaged in making little videos of us leveling, warring, or just having a good time. Some have worked on their videos a little more, creating exciting, funny, captivating entertainment. Whether it’d be spoofs of famous comedians or music videos of our day’s favorite songs, we all enjoy it.

But have movies taken over entirely? Are we so obsessed with movement, sounds, colors, special effects, that we’ve forgotten what pictures can tell us, what they can inspire? Is it the thing now to have a YouTube channel, or any other video uploading site subscriptions and membership, to show our daily lives in RuneScape?

Let’s just think about it. Most of us now have decent computers that can run video recording programs properly. Even more have the capability to take a simple screen shot and (worse case scenario) put it on MS Paint, crop, and save. Some of us will try to spend some money to get better software like Photoshop or Sony Vegas. How many of us actually take the time to go and try to use these programs and try to making something out of it, and make it RuneScape related? Not many, I think, when you compare it to the entire RuneScape population. It takes time and patience to learn all these new features with each program. Most can handle the basics. Some would use it to doctor their pictures to appeal to the audience more, or at least put a watermark to avoid having their bank pictures put on eBay. Others would actually move away from screen shots and use the programs to create fan art.

Using video capturing and editing programs takes some more effort. For one thing, the video must be of decent length. Too short and maybe people might miss the point of the video. Too long and some people may feel their attention spans are being tested. For another, it has to be edited in such a way that it would be entertaining to view (seizure-inducing effects, zooming in and out, rotations, sound effects, etc.). Of course, this isn’t to say that both pictures and videos don’t rely on quality. They both need to make sure there's a balance of the original composition and the new.

We all have some level of expectation when it comes to videos, however. How often do you see people comment on the actual picture itself, i.e. the angles used to take the picture, and the special texts put in to describe the picture, Photoshop work, etc.? Look at the Rate This! board and see. It seems the pictures literally line up to what they're meant to do: simply capture the moment. It doesn't matter if it was doctored up or not. It just shows what happened at that one moment. And people comment on that one moment.

Videos capture many moments at once. Go on YouTube for example, and type in "RuneScape." You're more than likely to find, out of the roughly 287,000 results, videos with comments about how good/bad the music is, how long/short the video was, how bland/colorful it was, etc. People comment more on the techniques used to create the video. Sure we still manage to capture the moment, and sure people do notice it, but there are those additional comments we don't seem to see often when it comes to plain pictures. And it seems we don't ask questions when it comes to videos either. How did that person do that? How did they get from point A to point B? The videos help answer all those questions. We've lost our ability to imagine how this person came to that special moment.

We've moved on from the old dark room days to brightly lit computer screens and humming printers. We've moved on from film to memory cards and hard drive space. Perhaps we have gone through some sort of media revolution. But remember, still pictures are the reason why we have movies today. Don't forget the picture that speaks a thousand words.

Did You Know...
... that the new Dragon Platebody is the first torso armor to give accuracy bonusses to Stab, Slash and Crush? It's only +1 though, but considering that the Dragon Platebody also has the best defensive bonus next to Guthan, Torag, and Dharok's plate, it is a worthy investment to consider if you plan to be training a long time. (Thanks to The Tal Shiar Alliance!)Note: This has been changed in a recent update and no longer is applicable... look forward to next week's DYK!

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